Our very first...

Some people who are overly-sentimental (guess which category I fall in?) like to reminisce about their "very firsts". While some of these events are rightly justified, our very first house for example, others belong in a category which most would just like to forget. This weekend, Mr. B and I had our own "very first" event which we would prefer to forget:

Our very first frozen and ruptured pipe! 

You read that right. What a beat down. 

We came home from dinner on Saturday night and when brushing our teeth (always important to practice proper dental hygiene no matter the home emergency!) we noticed the tap was running really slow. And then it stopped. Never a good sign. 

We raced to the basement - and yes, I went down there - to have a look around the well pump. A small leak from the crawl space underneath the bathroom extension caught our eye. The bathroom on the ground floor was flooded. We still haven't figured out where the rupture happened and how the water went "up" into the bathroom, but who am I question?

Like true Generation-Yers, we immediately got on the computer to find an answer. And we called my dad. A few google searches later and with Papa H's good advice, the problem was temporarily solved.  Shut off the main water, but first do an additional search to figure out which darn switch to use, clean up the mess and call a plumber. Easier said than done at 1:00am on a Sunday morning. 

One of the advantages of living a few houses down from your plumber?  He'll come over first thing Sunday morning without thinking twice and without charging extra. Thank you very much! The bad news? Yes, the pipe is busted. The good news? It doesn't really matter. The bathroom is going to get a massive makeover anyway in a few weeks, so rather than repair what might need to be redone later, we just shut off the water to that bathroom. Keep the light on in the crawlspace to generate some heat, and you're good as gold.

I think it's safe to say we had a pretty narrow miss though. We were fortunate the flooding was contained and didn't cause major damage. Old man winter can be brutal.

Two things to take away from this event:

1.  In our searches, we came across a great website called justanswer.com. No, I am not being paid to endorse this site, but I will tell you, it certainly saved our tooshes this weekend.  Check it out for yourselves. It is legit and it's pretty useful for when you're in a jam.

2. Sham-wow is really sham-wow. My best friend has raved about it for a while, and I just picked up a box at Marshalls Home Goods a few weeks ago. One cloth cleaned up the entire mess. Very impressive. 



Halloween & The Frogs

Happy Veteran's Day!

If you're wondering why there haven't been any posts lately, well, I'm afraid it's because there's not much to report. Unless, you care about the new well tank, the endless quest to fix the toilet pipes and deciding a new color for the roof? As much as I'd like to say we've done some great decorating or found new furniture, it's just not the case.

Life lately has been hectic as we've been working late / traveling on the weekends / catching up on sleep. We've managed to stay on top of the urgent items: Well tank, check. Overflowing toilets, hopefully fixed for now. New roof, errrr, working on it. Who knew there were so many different colors for a roof?

Halloween was quite the treat for us. (Get it? Treat! As in trick-or-treat!!) From day one when we moved in, our neighbors had been telling us to stock up on candy and get ready for a Halloween like no other. At first, we didn't really take them seriously. Candy for 150+ kids? But it became apparent when every neighbor was telling us the same story that we should probably take this seriously.

Go Frogs!

Since we're in a rural area, the local families all bring their kids to our town to run up and down Main Street. And when I say come into town, I mean they haul them in on the back of tractors. It's really cute. The houses along the road put luminaries in the middle of the road and everyone decorates their porches. We sat out on the porch in our rocking chairs with our pumpkin, scary lighting (okay, just an orange bulb!), scary music, and gave out...wait for it...full size candy bars! I was convinced these poor kids were probably scared of the house so we needed to bribe them. And bribe them we did.

And I know I promised this blog would be primarily about the house, I can't resist the urge to talk about our trip to Utah last weekend. Yes, Salt Lake City, for the weekend.

The #3 Frogs played the #5 Utes, and Mr. and Mrs. B made the traveling team, along with Junior, who gets all the credit for the pictures to follow. The game was a beat down on the Utes. Final score? TCU 47, Utah 7. It may have been one of the best sporting events of my life. It was great to catch up with friends old and new and spend some time in the mountains. Here's to our next big road trip...hopefully a BCS bowl again!

Pre-game tailgating with Junior.

One of Junior's friends: "Wow, you're like the same person."

We were hugely outnumbered...

It's highly likely we scored a touchdown on this exact play.

It was just that kind of game.

White Out - free tshirts from the Alumni Tailgate to counter Utah's Black Out.

Can you tell they only had size larges?  I'm practically drowning in cotton.

The visitors section: cheering for a win.

Yes, that says Utah 7 - TCU 47.

Domination.

Check back ASAP for real house updates: The architects visited this morning. I can hardly contain my excitement!